Taken
by SamanthaKathy
Summary: Charlie is in Hawaii for a math conference, and Don is along for a well earned vacation. But as Charlie is kidnapped and Don is injured, the Five-0 team might be the only hope of Charlie being found in time.


**Author's note: originally published 8 September 2011 on AO3. **

**Post-season 6 for Numb3rs, mid-season 1 for Hawaii Five-0 (before episode 1x18 with Matty Williams).**

**Written for the prompt: Numb3rs/H50, For some reason Don is in Hawaii, stumbles over Five-0's case (as a victim or stuck in a crossfire or whatever) then ends up helping the team...and maybe become friends?! *shrugs* ;p Gen H/C. Prompt by Callsign624.**

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

"I have to say, I like math conferences far more than I thought I would," Don said, slipping his sunglasses on as he stepped outside into the sun.

"Yeah, this one," Charlie said. "You wouldn't have liked the last one at all."

Don shot Charlie a curious look and his brother elaborated.

"It was in Chicago and there was a snowstorm. The heating in the hotel the conference was held in failed, airports were closed, it was one giant disaster. The only reason people are attending this year is because the conference is held in what amounts to paradise. And even then, they still had a lot of people saying no."

Don frowned. He couldn't remember his brother mentioning that. He was pretty sure he'd remember Charlie getting stuck in a hotel without heating in the middle of a snowstorm.

"I can't remember you saying anything about that," Don said.

"Ah, that would be because I wasn't there," Charlie replied. "I never was so grateful for an FBI case in my life when I heard the stories."

"Charlie, why didn't you say anything at the time," he said. "You know I'd have let you go to your conference."

At least, Don hoped Charlie knew that. Ever since pulling him into FBI work, Don had worried about his brother, but it had always been more about the danger he was putting Charlie in than the fact he was taking Charlie away from his real job.

"It was that case with the kids," Charlie said softly.

Well, that explained it. Charlie had been very upset during that case. Hell, everyone had been, cases with kids turning up dead were always hard. But Charlie wasn't an FBI agent, hadn't chosen this life, and he was always hit harder by the brutalities of humanity than Don, even after six years of working together.

"Well, what I really want to know is how you managed to finagle the conference organizers to pay for my trip as well," Don said.

He hoped to get Charlie's thoughts back into the here and now as well as sate his own curiosity. As far as he knew, there was no good reason for the organizers to pay for his trip to Hawaii, especially all expenses paid. Charlie's trip, yes, because he was one of the main speakers and probably one of the reasons there were so many people attending the conference.

"Ah, well," Charlie stammered, and he honest to God blushed.

"Oh, now this has got to be quite the story," Don teased.

"I might have told them that you were an FBI agent and that because of a case I'd worked, I couldn't travel without protection. They offered to pay for local protection, but I convinced them it had to be low-key, hence having you, my brother, provide it."

"And they bought that?" Don asked, half incredulous, half impressed by Charlie's duplicity.

"You're here, aren't you?" Charlie said, grinning.

"Yes, but lying?" Don asked.

It just wasn't something his brother often did. Charlie grimaced, but Don noticed he did not look repentant in the least.

"You needed it," he said. "We needed it."

Don sighed. Charlie was right, in some way. Being apart from his brother after working so close together all these years was harder than Don had thought. And on top of the fact that Charlie was working in another country, Robin had broken off the engagement. So he saw Charlie's point. And he'd always done the right thing, Don thought. Maybe this once, he could do something for himself. It wasn't like he was hurting anyone.

He shot Charlie a smile, and noticed his brother relaxed as he figured out Don wasn't mad at him for lying. Don let out a laugh and Charlie soon joined him. Yes, he was on a well deserved vacation in paradise, thanks to his brother, and at the moment, walking along with the sun shining down on them, life couldn't be better.

The sudden sound of screeching tires disrupted the peaceful atmosphere, and had Don reflexively grab for the gun he didn't have. He turned around, where three masked men came out of a black SUV. They made a beeline for Charlie and Don shifted in front of his brother.

"Charlie, run!" he shouted.

But of course his brother didn't listen. Before he knew it, the men were right there. Don grappled with one, landing a punch here and there, but not doing enough damage. While he was occupied, the two other men grabbed Charlie and started dragging him to the car. He was struggling, but he only managed to slow them down a bit.

Don punched the guy he was fighting with in the stomach and the man went down. He started running towards Charlie, when he was hit on the head from behind. He went down and while he was on the ground, he saw Charlie getting dragged in the car. Blackness was encroaching on his vision and he couldn't see the car's license plate. The last thing he heard before he lost consciousness completely was the distant wail of sirens, far too late to stop them from taking his baby brother.

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

"All right, Chin, brief us on this case, please," Steve said.

They were all gathered around the tech table. Chin looked best put together, but then again he'd been the one to get to the office first. Steve had called him when he'd received the Governor's call, as Danny had to drop Grace back at his ex-wife's house first and Steve had been on a hike. Kono had been surfing and they were lucky she periodically checked her phone even though this was their free day, or they'd be one member short. Danny looked grumpy, which Steve could relate to. None of them were exactly happy about being called in on a case on Saturday, but for Danny losing out on his time with his daughter it had to be even worse.

"Around an hour ago there was a kidnapping in Waikiki, broad daylight," Chin started.

He pulled up a security camera feed that had caught the event. Steve watched as a black SUV stopped and three masked men came out of it. They made a beeline for a young man, probably in his early thirties, who'd been walking with a slightly older man. Both were clearly tourists. Steve noticed the older man making a move with his hand, as if trying to reach for a weapon that wasn't there. He shouted something, and took on one of the assailants. He put up quite a fight, as did the victim when he was being dragged to the car by the two others. But in the end the victim was pulled inside, while the other man made a beeline for the car, having put the assailant on the ground. But apparently the assailant hadn't been out cold, as he got up and hit the man on the head with the butt of a gun. The man went down and the third assailant jumped in the SUV as well, then it raced off. The whole thing hadn't taken more than a minute.

"Who's the victim?" Danny asked.

"Professor Charles Eppes," Chin said. "He's a tenured professor of Applied Mathematics at CalSci in Los Angeles, but is currently doing a guest professorship at Cambridge. He's here for a math conference that starts on Monday, where he's one of the speakers."

"Okay, why would anyone grab a math professor? Is he or his family wealthy?" Kono asked.

"No, money is probably not the motive here," Chin said. "But there are plenty of motives to go around. For one, professor Eppes is a genius, one of the top minds in the world right now. Another thing is that he's got a very high security clearance, he's done consulting work for the NSA on several occasions, and he's been working closely with the FBI for the last six years. And that is not counting grabbing him to pressure his brother."

"That the man who was with him?" Steve asked.

"Yes, Don Eppes. FBI agent, recently promoted to Special Agent in Charge of the Major and Violent Crime division of the Los Angeles FBI office. Before that he was the head of one of the best Major and Violent Crime Units in the country. He worked together with his brother. They might have grabbed the professor to pressure him," Chin said.

Well, that explained why the guy had reached for a weapon, Steve thought. That didn't explain why he was here at the math conference, except perhaps for a vacation. But that would be a bit too much of a coincidence, and Steve didn't believe in coincidences.

"All right, Chin, I want to know about the family and what both of them were working on," Steve said. "How's the brother?"

"He's in the hospital and hasn't regained consciousness yet," Chin said. "I've got an HPD officer standing guard and they'll call as soon as he's able to talk."

"Good," Steve said. "Kono, get on tracking that car. In the mean time, Danny and I will go and have a talk with the organizers of the conference. See if we can find out some more about the brothers Eppes."

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

Charlie woke up with a groan. Whatever they had injected him with once he was in the car, it had left his mouth dry as cotton and his head feeling like he'd drunk an entire bottle of tequila. Considering he got hung-over from just three tequila shots, that was saying something. But he didn't think the queasy feeling in his stomach had anything to do with being drugged. It had appeared as soon as he realized Don was not with him in the tiny cell.

Charlie forced himself to look around, to try and find an escape. But there really wasn't much to look at. The cell was bare, concrete floor and walls, no window, the only light source a single light bulb above his head. He estimated that the cell was five by fifteen feet, and the ceiling about 8 feet high. The door looked to be solid steel, and a few taps on it confirmed Charlie's assumption.

With no supplies and no obvious escape routes, there was nothing to do but wait. Feeling miserable, Charlie sank down on the ground and wrapped his arms around his knees, curling his body in as much of a ball as he could. He started reciting all decimals of Pi, in the vain hope of getting his last sight of Don out of his head, lying unconscious on the ground, or maybe even dead. It didn't work, and as a small tear escaped from his tightly clenched shut eyes Charlie wished he had never brought Don to Hawaii.

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

"Professor Brower, thank you for seeing us," Steve said, shaking the man's hand.

Danny took the time to take in the elderly man, who seemed to embody the epitome of what Danny thought of when the word mathematician was mentioned. He wore kaki colored slacks and plaid shirt that was a truly awful shade of blue and brown. The only thing he was missing was big, round jam-jar glasses to make the picture complete.

"Oh, no, it's no problem at all," Professor Brower said. "I do hope you'll find Professor Eppes, I'll never forgive myself if something happens to him."

"We're doing everything we can, sir," Steve said.

"I just know I should have hired some extra security, despite what Professor Eppes said," the man said remorsefully.

"Extra security?" Danny asked. "He had security with him? Do you know why?"

There had been no sign of that on the tape, so where had they been?

"Oh, yes, his brother was here to provide low-key security. Apparently there was some kind of problem with a FBI case Professor Eppes had worked, but I'm afraid I don't know the details."

"That's all right, just tell us what you know," Steve said.

"Well, about a week and a half before the start of the conference Professor Eppes called and asked if it was possible he could bring his brother, as he needed the security. It's pretty well known these days that he helps his brother out with FBI cases. A lot of his papers in the last few years have had some basis in that work, although word is that he is working on something bigger as well," Professor Brower said. "But with a genius like Professor Eppes, well, such work could take years, especially with all the consulting he does on the side. So in the mean time he's devising some truly spectacular uses of classical math problems."

"And when he called you, you offered him extra security?" Danny interrupted, bringing the professor back to the case at hand.

"Oh, yes, we offered to provide him with local security. That's cheaper for us than having his brother here all expenses paid, but Professor Eppes was quite adamant that nobody could notice the security, which was why the FBI had appointed his brother," the professor said.

"Have there been any problems before today?" Steve asked.

"Not that I know of."

"Well, thank you very much for your help," Steve said.

They shook hands with the professor again, who to Danny seemed truly upset at the kidnapping, and left his office. When they were outside, Danny turned to Steve.

"Does any of this strike you as odd?"

"Yeah," Steve said, nodding. "Why, if Don Eppes was providing security for his brother, did he not have a gun?"

"Could be he forgot to take it with him?" Danny suggested.

Steve shot him an incredulous look, and even Danny had to admit that was unlikely. The elder Eppes had clearly reached for a gun on the tape, and had come up empty. If he was on security detail, especially if it was for his younger brother, he wouldn't have made the mistake of forgetting his gun. For people like Don Eppes, who'd been in law enforcement for most of their lives, taking your gun with you was such a habit that forgetting it was virtually impossible. Danny should know, he'd even taken his gun on a few of his dates with Rachel, just out of habit.

"Want to go take a look at the hotel room of the victim?" Danny asked as they got into the car.

Before Steve could answer his phone went. After a quick look, he put it on speaker.

"Go ahead, Chin," he said.

"I've managed to get a hold of Professor Eppes' wife in Cambridge. She was pretty shocked, understandably. She had no idea who would want to kidnap her husband," Chin said.

"The conference organizer reported that professor Eppes requested his brother come as undercover security. He mentioned trouble with an FBI case, but didn't have any details. Did the professor's wife mention anything like that?" Steve asked.

"No," Chin answered. "But she did say that her husband suddenly went back to the States a week before the conference was due to start. He told her he'd take the chance to visit with his family before going to Hawaii from Los Angeles, but it did strike her as odd. But I'll try to contact the FBI, find out what the threat was."

"Okay, thanks Chin," Steve said and hung up.

"Well, something was definitely going on," Danny said. "Suddenly going back to the States, bringing his brother, then getting kidnapped, bit too much of a coincidence, don't you think?"

"Yeah," Steve said. "But I'm not so sure it was official FBI business."

He started the car and drove in the direction of the hotel.

"So what? Some kind of threat they didn't report?"

Danny couldn't see how a law enforcement officer would not report a threat to his brother. And whatever was going on, Don Eppes was definitely in the know. If only he would wake up so they could question him.

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

The sound of a key in the lock had Charlie standing up. The door opened and two big, burly guys came in, each leveling a gun at him. Charlie warily pressed his back to the far wall, but they didn't move towards him, just taking up positions at either side of the door. The reason for that became apparent as another man entered, decked out in a business suit and unarmed.

"Charlie, how lovely to see you again," he said jovially.

"Agent Harrick," Charlie cried out surprised. Then, getting over his surprise, he angrily added: "Since when does the NSA resort to kidnapping?"

"Oh, I'm not currently working for the NSA," Harrick said with a cold smile.

And Charlie remembered now, that time he'd consulted for the NSA, how Harrick had kept hovering around him. The man had creeped him out then, made him nervous with his cold, hard look. No matter how cordial he'd been, there'd been something predatory in his gaze that had unsettled Charlie. He'd brushed it aside then as nothing more than his own imagination, but the current situation had him reevaluating that opinion.

"What do you want?" he asked.

What he really wanted to ask was how Don was, but he didn't expect Harrick to know or care. Not to mention he feared what the answer would be. And if, by some miracle, Harrick didn't know who Don was, Charlie saw no reason to advertise his brother's presence in Hawaii.

"What does anybody want from a genius, Dr. Eppes?" Harrick answered. "You're going to do some work for me."

"And if I don't?"

"Well, then your stay here will get decidedly _unpleasant_," Harrick said.

Charlie felt a stab of fear at the threat. He was under no illusions about the man before him, torture was definitely on the menu with him. So when Harrick left and his goons gestured for Charlie to follow him, he did without protest. But in the back of his mind, there was only one mantra playing: stall him, give Don time to find you, send a signal if you can. The possibility that Don was in no shape to find him might be present, but for once Charlie ignored a mathematical possibility in favor of blind faith in his big brother.

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

"Nothing seems out of place here," Danny said as he looked around the hotel room.

One of the brothers, Danny was willing to bet it had been Charles, had completely unpacked, while the other one had only hung up some things and left most of his clothes in his suitcase. A quick look at the label confirmed Danny's suspicions. Don Eppes had only unpacked as much as he needed. He wondered if there was any significance to that, but figured if Don had expected he'd need to get away fast he wouldn't have let his brother unpack either. So it was probably a habit he'd developed somewhere.

"There's no sign of a gun here," Steve said. "I really don't think he had one with him."

"There's nothing here that helps us either find out who took Charles or why," Danny said.

"Let's head back to headquarters, see what Kono and Chin have dug up," Steve said.

The roads were busy with the lunch hour crowd and it took thirty minutes to make it back to headquarters. Danny was very aware of the ticking clock, knowing that every minute they didn't find Charles Eppes was a minute closer to them searching for a corpse instead. Even heavier was the weight of the knowledge that there hadn't been a ransom call yet, meaning they probably hadn't taken the professor for money. But that still left so many other possibilities, and none of them were good.

Danny didn't have to look at the tense face of his partner to know that Steve was running all the scenarios through his head and coming up with the same conclusion. If Chin and Kono hadn't found anything, their only hope of finding Charles Eppes lay with what his brother could tell them – his brother who still hadn't woken up.

Once they got to headquarters, they found a dejected looking Kono and a frustrated Chin. Danny softly cursed. No good news to be had here then, although he knew that they'd have called if they had anything.

"What's the status?" Steve asked.

"I've just come off the phone with an agent Granger, who until a few months ago worked on the same team as Don Eppes and still works in the LA office," Chin said. "He said Don didn't say anything about trouble, but about two weeks before Charles suddenly flew back to the States he became tense and, in agent Granger's words, snappy. There's nothing about an official case in any of the files either. He's going to e-mail me all the active cases of agent Eppes and the cases that are due in court, so hopefully that will give us a lead."

"Good, cross-check those names with anyone flying in to Hawaii for the past month," Steve said.

"Agent Granger will also contact Alan Eppes, the brother's father, and he said he'd try to get in touch with Don's fiancé Robin Brooks. She's an Assistant US Attorney and currently in Portland for a major RICO case, so he's not sure he'll be able to reach her."

"Great, just what we need," Danny groused. "Another reason for someone to kidnap Charles and attack Don."

"You think maybe this is about sabotaging the RICO case?" Steve asked.

Danny thought back to the kidnapping that had been caught on the security cam. The kidnappers had gone straight for Charles and had only injured Don because he got in the way. With a sigh, he shook his head.

"No, Charles Eppes was definitely the target," he said. "If they wanted to sabotage the RICO case, they'd have gone after Don."

"Okay, so what about the car, any luck?" Steve asked.

Kono shook her head, while at the same time she pulled up some traffic and surveillance camera stills.

"I managed to track the car for a while, but then they entered an area where there is no camera's and I lost them. Last I know they went north," she said. "HPD is looking, but unless they actually spot it…"

It was a long shot, and they all knew it. And Danny had learned enough about the island to know that to the north there was a lot of wilderness, the perfect place to hide a car and a kidnapped professor.

"All right, so what have we got right now?" Steve said. "About three weeks ago Don Eppes started acting tense, like something was wrong. A week later his brother starts acting the same in England, then flies back unexpected to the US. They come to Hawaii together, telling the conference organizer that Don Eppes was providing low-key security because of a problem with a case."

"Which we know there wasn't, at least not officially," Chin chimed in.

Steve's phone rung and he walked a bit away from them to take the call.

"This doesn't make any sense," Kono said. "If there were threats made against Charles, wouldn't he be the one to start acting tense first?"

"So what, you think the threats were against Don? Why would Charles fly back then? If anything his brother would want to keep him far away," Danny said. "Besides, if Don or Charles were threatened, especially because of a case, they'd have the entirety of the Los Angeles FBI office behind them. So why not report it?"

"I've got no clue either," Chin said. "Something was definitely going on, but what?"

"I'm thinking the only one that's going to be able to tell us is Don Eppes," Danny said.

"Lucky for us then that he just woke up," Steve said, as he walked towards them while putting his phone away. "You two, work through those files as soon as agent Granger sends them over, and keep looking for that car." He turned to Danny. "Come on, let's go get some answers."

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

The moment the doctor left his room, Don worked himself up to a sitting position. His head was swimming with dizziness and his stomach was rolling, but he didn't let that stop him. The doctor could say all he wanted about having to stay in the hospital for observation. He'd dealt with concussions before, even ones that had knocked him out for quite some time, and he could handle it. Right now, he needed to find Charlie, and he'd already lost almost three hours because he'd been unconscious.

Just as he was about to removed the IV from his arm the door to his room opened to reveal two men. One was a stocky blond with a tie that screamed cop and the other was tall, dark haired, and had that military stance that Colby still had as well. For a moment hope soared in Don't chest, maybe they had found Charlie? But then his trained eye noticed the lines of stress in the faces before him and he knew they hadn't. They were simply here to question him because he was the primary witness and now awake – standard procedure he would have gone through as well had he caught this case.

"I'm Detective Williams, this is Commander McGarrett," the blond man said. "Are you up for a few questions?"

Don raised the back of his bed while he nodded. Yes, he would answer their questions and then he'd get the hell out of here, and he would find Charlie.

"Can you tell us what happened?" McGarrett asked.

Don recounted the event as it had happened, giving them as many details as he could. It was pitiful little, as he'd seen no faces and no number plate. When he fell silent, a look passed between the two men, and then Williams cleared his throat.

"We were informed by the conference organizer that there was a thread to your brother," he said. "Could you tell us about that?"

Don closed his eyes and groaned, remembering the little white lie Charlie had only confessed that morning, what seemed like ages ago. From the detective's face, he'd already verified that there was no official threat. It didn't surprise Don, it would have been as easy as a phone call, and with matters the way they were, he knew that lying would only delay the search for Charlie.

"There was no threat," he said. "Charlie just said that so they would pay for my trip."

"But something was wrong," the detective pressed. "You were described as tense and snappy, beginning two weeks before the conference. Your brother's wife also told us that a week before the conference he suddenly flew out to the states, to see you?"

Don closed his eyes as the implied question at the end brought up memories he had come to Hawaii to forget. But above all that was the warm feeling that he still got when he'd heard Charlie's voice through the phone, asking him to come pick him up from LAX. That his brother had dropped everything and flown half-way across the world for him was something that he couldn't have dreamed up six years ago. So much had changed since then, a lot for the better.

"Yeah, he came to see me," Don said, his voice breaking to his shame.

"What happened?"

The detective's voice was soft, but he was unrelenting in his quest for answers. Despite not wanting to drag the whole thing up, Don had to respect the guy for that, even as he hated him for it as well.

"My fiancé broke up with me," Don said. "She…we've broken up before, back when we were just dating, but I think she really meant it this time. She's moving to Portland and she doesn't want me to go with her. She gave me back her ring, said she'd made a mistake."

Don took a deep breath, burying his feelings of hurt. He needed to focus on Charlie now, not himself.

"Charlie and I talk about once a week on the phone. When he left for England I promised him we'd stay in touch, so we find the time to call once a week. He knew something was wrong and kept pestering me, so I told him. Nobody else even knows yet. He flew back home, didn't even tell me until he was at LAX. And he arranged for me to come with him to Hawaii, all expenses paid. I didn't even know what he'd told the conference organizer until this morning."

"All right," the detective said. "Thank you for your cooperation. We'll let you know as soon as we find anything, okay."

Don nodded, although he had no intention of staying in the hospital. But he was careful to keep any trace of that from his face. The moment the detective and his partner left, he gently removed the IV from his arm. He swung his legs out of bed, then had to wait a moment before the room stopped spinning. Gently he stood up, keeping a hand on the bed until he was certain his legs would hold him up. A quick check of the closet in his room provided him with his clothes, dirty and bloody though they were. He pulled them on, then had to sit on his bed for a second to wait for the dizziness to pass again.

With careful steps he made his way out of his room. He was cautious, knowing that if he was caught by the nurses he was in no condition to fight them if they refused to let him go. So he kept his steps purposeful, face away from them, and was very careful not to sway or grab the wall for support. But in keeping his face away from the nurses' station, he also missed the fact that the detective and his partner hadn't left yet.

"Hey! Where do you think you're going?" Detective Williams called out.

Don winced, stopped, turned around, then quickly had to grab something in order to stay standing as the floor suddenly turned into a rough ocean. Unfortunately, the closest thing was McGarrett, whose lightning fast reflexes kept Don from face-planting on the floor.

"You all right?" McGarrett asked.

"No, I'm not fucking all right! My brother's been kidnapped and they're doing God knows what to him!" Don shouted, wrenching his arm out of McGarrett's grasp. "And if you think I'm going to go back to bed and stay there as long as Charlie is still out there, then you're insane."

"You can't…" McGarrett started.

"Let him come," Williams interrupted him.

McGarrett threw his partner an incredulous look, which Williams returned without flinching. McGarrett just huffed and started walking to the exit. Detective Williams waited until Don started walking, then stayed close, probably in case Don became dizzy again.

"Thanks," Don said softly, knowing Williams would have been totally in his right to have him excluded from the investigation.

"I'm a big brother too," was all Williams said.

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

Danny knew he was going to catch a lot of shit from Steve once this was all over for his decision to let Don Eppes come with them. Hell, he knew the guy belonged in a hospital bed. But he knew how the guy felt. His baby brother was in trouble and he wanted to help. Danny could relate. Besides, one more experienced eye to look over what little material they had could only help them, especially as Don Eppes would know all of Charlie's enemies, as well as his own. And the clock was still ticking.

Back at headquarters, Chin and Kono were still busy trying to find a lead – any lead. Kono was busy checking the files agent Granger had sent over against flight manifests from the past month, while Chin was digging into Charles' records to see if there might have been some unexplained activity. Danny planted Don on a chair after giving him one of Steve's clean shirts to put on, while Steve asked for an update.

"Lots of potential enemies connected to agent Eppes," Kono said with a nod to Don, "but none that seem to be in Hawaii right now."

"I can help you go through them, tell you which ones are the most likely to do something like this," Don offered.

"How about you, Chin? Find anything?" Steve asked.

"There was nothing that stood out in his phone records," Chin answered. "I was just about to check his e-mail account."

With a few deft finger movements Chin had Charles Eppes' e-mail account opened and showing on one of the big screens.

"Wow, somebody needs to invest in a better spam filter," Danny said.

The inbox of the account was full of unread spam messages, all the same, advertising a Chuck Norris action doll.

"That's not spam," Don suddenly cried out. "It's a message."

Everybody in the office turned to him. Danny could virtually see Steve gearing up to take Don back to the hospital, and quite frankly with a statement like that he himself was questioning the severity of the man's concussion. Spam as a message? It sounded like he was grasping at straws, but right now they had nothing better.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"It's Charlie, the spam, it's being send by Charlie," Don said, intent and sounding utterly confident. "I call him Chuck, and see the time stamps? There's always exactly nine minutes and eleven seconds between the e-mails."

"9-1-1," Danny said, seeing where Don was going with this.

"It's Charlie," Don said again.

"He's capable of doing this?" Steve asked.

He didn't sound as disbelieving as Danny had thought he would, and Chin was already working on chasing down the IP address of the computer the e-mails came from, and hopefully he'd also come up with a real address.

"If they gave him access to a computer with internet connection, hell yeah," Don answered Steve's question.

"Considering they didn't ask for ransom, nor made any other demands, it's logical to assume they grabbed him to work for them," Danny said.

"Which means they would've given him a computer to do the work," Steve added.

"I've got a location," Chin said.

"All right, gear up," Steve commanded.

Don came right along with them, and nobody protested. Danny was under no illusion that they could've kept the FBI agent from accompanying them, even if they'd have tried. The others seemed to have realized it as well, because nobody tried. He did see Steve throw a warning glance at him and he knew his partner would hold him responsible for Don – the joys of having stood up for the guy in the hospital. But Danny took the look as tacit approval and handed Don his back-up gun. He got an appreciative nod in return. He blew out a breath as Steve pulled out of the parking lot with squealing tires behind Kono's car, and just hoped his trust in the man currently squashed up in the backseat of the Camaro wasn't misplaced

H50N3H50 N3H50N3

Don was under no illusions. He was here only because this team, Five-0 as they called themselves, was letting him. He couldn't be more grateful if he tried. He needed to be here, needed to get to Charlie, not wait back in their office for a phone call. He didn't care that he'd been delegated to the rear, that he was basically back-up for this team as they went in, only to enter if they called out the all clear. He had a concussion and was still not entirely steady on his feet, he understood. But at least he was _here_.

Still, the wait was getting to him. The old run-down house was surrounded and any moment now they would breach. He saw them go in and expected them to call out who they were, but they went in silent, like a military team. It was then that he'd remembered Danny William's quick explanation of Five-0 on the way from the hospital to their office – full means and immunity, they didn't have to announce themselves. He breathed a sigh of relief, for in this case it could mean the difference between Charlie surviving and… No, he wasn't going there. Whoever had him would have no warning they were about to be taken down, they couldn't use Charlie as a human shield or take him out.

Suddenly gunfire sounded from inside and Don was tempted to go in. With great self-restrained he stayed put, clenching his borrowed gun in his hands. When the all-clear call came through the equally borrowed headset he didn't know how fast he could make it inside. And then he was face-to-face with his brother, his alive and unharmed baby brother.

"Don," Charlie cried out.

Don suddenly felt dizzy again, although it had nothing to do with the concussion this time, and choked out Charlie's name as he grabbed his brother in a hug.

'You got my message," Charlie whispered.

"Yeah, Chuck, I did," Don whispered back.

In the background he saw three men in cuffs being led out of the building by the team, and outside the sound of sirens was coming closer, probably HPD back-up to secure the crime scene, and hopefully an ambulance to check Charlie over. But for once Don didn't care about all of that – he trusted the Five-0 team to handle everything. All he had to do was hold on to his little brother.

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Danny took another sip of his beer and leaned back to survey his surroundings. They were all gathered in one of the bars Five-0 frequented often enough to get a discount on the days they were a bit singed around the edges. Only this time it wasn't just Five-0, Don and Charlie Eppes were there too. For a math professor and an FBI agent, they fit in surprisingly well, Danny thought.

Charlie and Chin were deep into some sort of discussion about tracking criminal finances, and Danny had given up on following the conversation an hour and two beers ago. Don and Steve were talking cop-shop, trading stories about their weirdest, wildest cases, with Kono hanging on to their every word. Danny had already figured out that he was going to have to take Kono aside sometime tomorrow and explain in great detail all the things that were non-procedural in those cases, because he had the feeling she was taking notes. Also, he was going to have to have a stern talk with Steve about not corrupting the rookie, again.

But, all in all, Danny was rather enjoying the evening. The case, while harrowing to begin with, had been resolved in half a day with no-one but the bad guys any worse for wear. Don was even having a beer, although he was taking it slow, so Danny figured the concussion wasn't too bad.

"What are you thinking about, pulling such a long face?" Steve asked.

Danny looked up, startled out of his contemplations, to find his partner's attention solely on him. Don and Kono were now in a deep conversation, and Danny hadn't even noticed. He must have had more to drink than he thought.

""Just thinking about the case,"" he answered Steve.

"Yeah, fucked up mess, rogue NSA agent thinking to get rich by betraying everything he stood for,"" Steve said. ""He didn't even care that cracking that code and then selling it could lead to a major terrorist attack on US soil. I sincerely hope the bastard rots in jail for the rest of his life."

"Oh, I think he will," Danny said with a big grin.

Steve gave him a questioning look.

"Let's just say that the dumbest move Harrick made wasn't trying to crack and sell that code,"" Danny said. "It was kidnapping Don's baby brother. If he's smart, he'll go to jail and never come out, because if Don gets his hands on him…"

"And I am sure you…appraised….Harrick about this, right partner?" Steve said with a big grin of his own.

Danny just grinned. You didn't mess with baby brothers, and Danny had made certain Harrick understood that. So yeah, this day was a pretty good one. And when he got home, he would give his own baby brother a call. It had been too long since they'd talked.


End file.
